Visions du Réel 2026 Group Attendance: Meet the Producers

We are delighted to introduce the five UK-based producers selected for a Group Attendance to Visions du Réel (Nyon, Switzerland) from 19–23 April 2026, supported by the BFI Doc Society Fund and the BFI National Lottery International Connections Fund.

These brilliant producers will have the opportunity to meet potential international partners, explore co-production opportunities, and gain wide industry insights through the festival's Industry Programme. They will be able to take part in a range of VdR Industry activities, including roundtables, one-to-one meetings and networking events. The cohort was selected through a UK-wide call for applications.

Each delegate is attending with a bold, distinctive body of work spanning international co-productions, artist-led storytelling, and socially engaged documentary. Together, they represent a powerful range of voices shaping the future of non-fiction film.

If you'd like to set up a meeting with any of them, whether on site or online, or would like to find out more, please email sanne@docsociety.org and luke@docsociety.org.

From the image above, producers are listed here from left to right, starting top left.

Axel Haudiquet

Axel Haudiquet is a producer with a background in advertising. Born in France, he moved to the UK nearly 20 years ago and now works across broadcast documentaries, impact storytelling, and international co-productions. A EURODOC alumnus, Axel is driven by a commitment to making meaningful films that resonate with audiences and inspire change globally. His feature documentary OCEANS APART forced World Rugby to align its regulations with the Human Rights Convention, won the Grand Prix at FIFO, and screened at major international festivals worldwide.

Elhum Shakerifar

Elhum Shakerifar is a BAFTA-nominated producer, curator, poet and translator; she runs the London-based company Hakawati ('storyteller' in Arabic). Her credits include A SYRIAN LOVE STORY (2015, Sean McAllister), OF LOVE & LAW (2017, Hikaru Toda), EVEN WHEN I FALL (2017, Sky Neal & Dara McLarnon) and AYOUNI (2020, Yasmin Fedda). She was recently Executive Producer of Helene Kazan’s multi-sensory investigative tribute to Asmahan, CLEAR NIGHT (2025), and is currently producing films by Ana Naomi de Sousa, Brett Story and Mohamed Jabaly. Elhum is on the executive board of the Palestine Film Institute, where she co-curates the Palestine Film Platform.

Isabelle Stead

Isabelle Stead is a UK-based writer, producer and director working across documentary and fiction, recognised for authored, international and socially engaged storytelling. Her producing credits include the BIFA-winning SON OF BABYLON, IN MY MOTHER'S ARMS and IRAQ: WAR, LOVE, GOD & MADNESS, with films premiering and screening at major festivals including Berlinale, Sundance, IDFA, Sheffield DocFest, CPH:DOX, Toronto and Tribeca. She is a Sundance alumna and a former British Council Producer on the Move, and is currently developing a slate of ambitious, internationally focused film, documentary and immersive projects.

Lucy Draper

Lucy Draper is a London-based documentary producer and BAFTA Connect member. Having started her career as a journalist, she then made the transition to documentaries where she expanded and evolved her story-telling skills. Her first short film, WHERE THE SUN ALWAYS SHINES, was funded by BFI Doc Society and premiered at SXSW before going on to be screened at multiple Oscar and BAFTA-qualifying festivals. Lucy worked on Carol Salter's Oscar-qualifying film VISITING HOURS, and on the A24 / Muck Media feature documentary, OPEN WIDE as a producer. The film was released on Netflix in 2024. Lucy is currently in post-production for HERE TO STAY, a BFI Doc Society short made with director Sheida Kiran, and CASA MIA - a funded documentary by director Alexandra Genova. She produced Christiaan Cargill's feature WOLF, EP'd by Tilda Swinton and currently in post-production. Lucy has a slate of features in development, including CROSSED with the director Carla Grande, telling the story of two Mexican friends offering abortion care to women in the US, and Carol Salter's new feature, TIME PIECES which received RAD funding from the BFI and Uncertain Kingdom.

Tina Gharavi

Born in Tehran, Gharavi is a BAFTA/Sundance-nominated director known for delivering authentic stories lensed with an impeccably wrought perspective. Trained as a painter in the US and later in cinema in France, she has created films on subjects ranging from Muhammad Ali and teenage sexuality to refugees, death row exonerees, to Virginia Woolf. Her first short, CLOSER, premiered at Sundance, where it was praised for advancing documentary form. MOTHER/COUNTRY, chronicling her return to Iran after 23 years, aired on Channel 4 to critical acclaim, while works such as THE KING OF SOUTH SHIELDS and PEOPLE LIKE US continue her exploration of outsiders and power. Her debut feature, I AM NASRINE, was BAFTA-nominated. Recent projects include AFRICAN QUEENS: THE LIFE OF CLEOPATRA for Netflix and her upcoming feature VIRGINIA WOOLF'S NIGHT & DAY (2026). Her next feature, FOROUGH: LET US BELIEVE IN THE BEGINNING OF THE COLD SEASON will be EP'd by Wes Anderson and concerns the life of an Iranian poet from the 1950s/60s. An MIT Fellow and BAFTA member, she teaches internationally and divides her time between Newcastle and Paris.